


To Run on Nothing

by ParckBench



Series: The Unknown Regions [1]
Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars: Force Unleashed - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-02
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-02-15 21:56:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2244729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ParckBench/pseuds/ParckBench
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Princess, a Royal Guardsman, and a reluctant Imperial Lieutenant. What sounds like the start of a bad joke will take Lieutenant Ashil places he never wanted to go. </p><p>Set during The Force Unleashed video game.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Run on Nothing

**Author's Note:**

> Rough-ish draft. Actually looking for a beta reader, if anyone is interested let me know :)
> 
> Also, just letting you know, the "explicit" rating applies more to upcoming chapters.
> 
> This is my first multi chaptered thing, so feedback is really really appreciated :)

Chapter 1

The heat was a special kind of oppressive.

Special in the sense that there was nothing quite as effective as waiting in this kind of heat for a ceremony to start -- decked out in full ceremonial dress uniform complete with excessively starched collar -- to get you pondering what exactly where you had gone wrong as a person to get you to this point.

Not that anyone had ever bothered to ask him, but if Lieutenant Ashil had to name one of the many and varied things he hated about his job, ceremonies would be right up there on the top of the list along with caf fetching and being his superior's enlisted captive audience. If he had known it would be like this, he would have opted out of a career in the military and stayed home like his mother had wanted. Or, more realistically, he would have evaded the 'recruitment' officers a little more skilfully.

The unfortunate reality of existence as Captain Ozzik Sturn's personal adjutant however was that every once in awhile, there would be a day like this. Where he would have to retrieve his dress uniform from it's customary place in the deepest, most untouched place in his wardrobe, and hover uncomfortably in the background while beads of sweat trickled down the backs of his thighs and his superior preened himself in front of whatever dignitary had decided to grace their backwater hovel with their presence. 

I wonder who it is this time, Ashil thought ruefully as sweat started to gather beneath his collar. Whoever it was, they were late. Night was falling and the small insects were gathering when they finally heard the first, far off rumble of engines, signalling the arrival of their visitors. Soon after he spotted a small craft coming in over the heavily forested area surrounding the compound. It was surprisingly nondescript. Medium sized goods transport, slate grey except for the spattering of faded colour marking out the Imperial insignia and the vessel's name.

The craft flew in several slow, ponderous circles around the clearing, much to the silent consternation of the group gathered below. Whether this was ascertain the secureness of the landing area or merely for effect, Ashil wasn't sure. His habitual nervousness began to compound, and he fought the urge to rock back on his heels. The craft circled once more, beginning its descent with a graceful arc. In front of him, it would seem to most that Sturn was engaging in his usual primping. The Lieutenant however, forced to spend a majority of his day in close proximity, perceived the slight shake of his meaty hands as they smoothed down the pristine white material of his Captain's uniform. He was nervous too. A bad sign.  
The craft had landed smoothly ahead of them, and Ashil automatically fell into step behind Sturn as the doors opened and the exit ramp extended. He wasn't sure exactly what he had been expecting, but it certainly wasn't the two dozen or so white armored Stormtroopers who came pouring out of the glow of the ships entrance. With brisk efficiency, they fell into neat rows flanking the ramp and stood rigidly at attention.

Ashil barely had time to blink before a figure came striding out in their wake. A woman? She was dressed completely in white, and in quite a simple fashion at that. She was pale and, he noticed, quite beautiful. A stark contrast to the usual dignitaries they received. Remarkably self possessed too, considering her escorts. 

Having never traveled far beyond the outer territories of the Empire, and certainly never to Coruscant, Ashil could never have claimed to have seen their like in person, but there was no mistaking who they were.  
Palpatine's Royal Guardsmen. 

They were without the usual accoutrements Ashil had heard described, no elaborate crimson cape or tunic to cover their battle armour. But there was something in the way they moved; something which marked them as different, even to Ashil's untrained eye. Something in the way they held their shoulders, or gripped their force pikes. These weren't ordinary soldiers. A slight sense of foreboding began to curl in the young Lieutenant's stomach. Who was this woman? She finished her graceful descent and came to a stop directly in front of Captain Sturn. 

"Ah, Princess Leia," Sturn began, his voice dripping with poorly concealed disdain. "It is an honour to have a senatorial observer.'

'You can drop the charade, Captain Sturn,' she cut him off sharply, obviously unintimidated, despite her modest stature. 'We both know I was sent here as a hostage, to keep my father from speaking out against the Empire.'

Ashil watched the scene unfold with a sense of detached fascination. Princess Leia? The name sounded vaguely familiar, but he couldn't place it. As a rule, the particulars of galactic politics weren't something he followed with any sort of great interest. He let his gaze wander a bit, taking in the crowd at large. Sergeant Chapelyn was standing to attention nearby, the sharp lines of his face neatly composed in a mask of disciplined neutrality - something that all Imperial troops learned to adopt as a necessity very early on. 

The Sergeant was one of the many friends in this facility Lieutenant Ashil didn't have. His face bore no evidence that he had ever smiled, and his gargantuan stature meant that the poor woman rigidly standing to attention behind him probably had a stellar view of the spot right between his shoulder blades. There was something about him Ashil had always liked though. He lacked the propensity towards mild disdain or disgust that the others habitually displayed around him, instead conducting himself with a gruff sense of kindness and an understated, laconic sense of humour. 

'Of course,' Sturn finished, his voice sharply bringing Ashil back to the present. 'Come along, Lieutenant.'

And with that, the ceremony was abruptly finished. The facility's contingent of Stormtroopers were taking cues from their officers and promptly dispersing, and somewhere behind him he could hear Chapelyn's booming voice issuing a reprimand. Ashil fell in behind the Captain and the captive Princess; far enough to satisfy decorum, but not so close as to seem as if he were eavesdropping. Which, naturally, he was. His opportunism yielded no positive results however, their "guest" seemingly determined to maintain a stony silence. 

The Captain had offered his arm to the Princess in a mockery of noble court custom, and it was clear to Ashil she was trying to put as much space between their bodies as humanly possible without it being completely obvious. The Lieutenant trailed awkwardly behind them like the ring bearer in a particularly miserable wedding as they proceeded through the massive gates of the compound. 

The Guardsmen weren't doing much to help either. Ashil found himself uncomfortably aware of their presence behind him. The measured footfalls of the pair in front of him only seemed to increase in volume as they walked, echoing off the walls in the otherwise silent corridors and setting his teeth on edge. After a time he realised he couldn't actually hear the Guardsmen behind him. 

As he took that first step onto the glass bridge overlooking the gardens, that was when he felt it.

It was subtle, the sensation of little pinpricks travelling up his spine and he couldn't help but shiver. Habit, deeply ingrained, was the only thing that stopped Ashil from spinning around and just as quickly as it arrived it had disappeared, leaving Ashil uneasy with a deep sense foreboding and of skin barely touched.  
* * *

As a rule, the preparations for visitors like this were usually handled by the other adjutants. That is, the ones who were better versed in protocol and courtly manners, and not some "backwater little bugslut," as Sturn had so eloquently named Ashil on numerous occasions. So it was a surprise when several weeks previously Sturn had informed him that he would be the one to be making the arrangements for this particular visit, eyes narrowed over his morning cup of caf. To add to the surprise, Sturn had neglected to inform the Lieutenant exactly who it was he was supposed to be preparing for; cutting off Ashil's half finished question by sliding some data cards impatiently across the table and gesturing sharply at the door. 

He'd been expecting a list of the normal preparations and paraphernalia, but to his complete bewilderment, instead of finding matching curtains for the guest quarters in the upper part of the main complex, he found himself ordering the installation of barred windows and triple reinforced doors in the storage area adjacent to Captain Sturn's troophy room. Instead of lavish furnishings, personalised to match the preferences and status of the visitor, he was requisitioning an extra cot and linens from the troop quarters. 

Unsurprisingly, the Princess seemed less than pleased with her new accommodations, and Ashil couldn't bring himself to blame her. 

He winced inwardly as she threw a look of thinly veiled disgust at a particularly unsettling trophy of a Gungan sealed in carbonite, its face contorted into a perpetual mask of horror. 'Am I to stay here the entire time?' she asked tartly.

'Of course not, Princess,' Sturn replied smoothly. 'You will be permitted to leave your quarters for precisely one hour per day, provided one of your...escorts accompanies you,' he said, gesturing to the crimson clad guards towering silently at the entrance. He paused, a small smile quirking the corner of his mouth. 'And I'm sure Lieutenant Ashil here would be more than happy to attend to any need you might have.'

The Lieutenant twitched uncomfortably, still slightly off kilter and desperately willing himself not to look disgusted as Princess Leia's head snapped in his direction, seeming to notice his presence for the first time. He should have figured Sturn would pull something like this. She measured him with a penetrating stare that bordered on haughty; looking entirely unimpressed with the pale, resigned looking adjutant hovering half out of sight behind his superior. Finally, her dark eyes came to rest on his face. 

To her credit, she didn't stare like he was expecting. Any diplomat worth a damn was too well conditioned to completely give themselves away like that. Her gaze lingered only fractionally longer than it should have before promptly dismissing him. She turned back to the Captain, fixing him with a stare that could have shattered stone before striding into her cell. Ashil would have laughed if he hadn't known it would cost him a weeks wages. Maybe this wasn't going to be so bad after all.

Sturn chuckled in that oily way of his as the door closed behind her with a resounding clang. 'Spirited, isn't she?'

Ashil opened his mouth to reply, but his response died stillborn as his throat closed sickeningly. It was worse this time and he couldn't stop himself as the hairs on the back of his neck stood up and there were the beginnings of a sound like static. His eyes darted towards the doorway where the Guardsmen stood in motionless silence and with a horrible certainty, his eyes focused on the one standing nearest to him. 

The crimson helmet turned almost imperceptibly towards him and Ashil knew he was looking right at him, and somewhere in that moment, Ashil knew his life here was over.

Somewhere in the back of his head, idly, he wondered again what he had done to deserve this.


End file.
